motherangst

The postings that you see are political in nature, and important (in my humble opinion) to our world and its future. I've been disgusted, repulsed, and in a state of revulsion ever since the Republicans reared their ugly right-wing heads and decided for once and all, that every small step taken for humankind should be eradicated. So if you find this blog biased, you're not in a minority.

Wednesday, November 01, 2006

Falcon Base? October 10? What Happened?

We all recall that late on the evening of October 10, 2006, Iraqi resistance groups lobbed mortar and rocket rounds into the immense Falcon Forward Base, the largest American military base in Iraq, located 13 km south of the Green Zone in Baghdad. In addition to intense mortar fire, Grad and Katyusha rockets were also used in the attack.

At the time, the resistance groups involved estimated large numbers of casualties as JUS reported. But in what has become standard procedure, these reports were dismissed as “disinformation”, with US military stating that there was not a single casualty in the massive attack that ignited the entire weapons arsenal housed there, caused major damaged to the base and forced its complete evacuation.

Say what?

Falcon base was designed to house a large contingent of American troops, mostly drawn from the 4th Infantry Division, stationed at Fr. Bliss, Texas. At the time of the attack, there were approximately 3000 men inside the camp, which also was filled with ammunition supplies, fuel, tanks and vehicles.

Iraqi contractors had assisted in the construction of the camp, which occupied nearly a square mile and was surrounded with guard tower-studded high concrete walls, and it is now apparent that Resistance fighters had accurate intelligence from insiders that provided important information on the layout of the base and key target areas within the facility.

After the initial shelling, fuel and ammunition stores began to erupt with massive explosions that could be heard, and seen, miles away inside the Green Zone where U.S. military and diplomatic units were heavily guarded.

The explosions, all of them termed “immense” by mainstream press continued throughout the night.

In response, US aircraft indiscriminately rocketed and bombed various parts of the citytrying to knock out the launch sites of the rockets’

The BBC's Andrew North, in Baghdad said the explosions started at about 2300 and became "ever more frequent" as the huge fires spread throughout the base, punctuated by tremendous explosions as more fuel and ammunition dumps ignited.

Lieutenant Colonel Jonathan Withington, spokesman for the U.S. 4th Infantry Division said that their intelligence sources indicated that civilians aligned with militias were responsible for the mortar attack.

An after action report, issued by the Department of Defense, reads as follows :

“On October 10, 2006, at approximately 10:40 p.m., a 82mm mortar round, fired by militia forces from a residential area in Abu T-Shir, caused a fire at an Ammunition Supply Point (ASP) at FOB Falcon. The ASP, containing tank and artillery rounds, in addition to smaller caliber ammunition, set off a series of large explosions. About 100 troops from the 4th Infantry Division were reported to be stationed at the base at the time, but no injuries were reported. The damage to the area will not degrade the operational capability of MND-B (Multinational Division Baghdad)."

When the flames had been brought under control on the morning of the 11th of October, primarily because the entire camp had been gutted, nine large American military transports with prominent Red Cross markings were observed by members of the foreign media taking off, landed with the dead and the wounded.

Now it has been learned that over 300 American troops including US Army and Marines, CIA agents and US translators were among the casualties and there also were 165 seriously injured requiring major medical attention and 39 suffering lesser injuries. In addition, 122 members of the Iraqi armed forces were killed and 90 seriously injured who were also evacuated to the U.S. military hospital at al-Habbaniyah located some 70km west of Baghdad.’

Satellite pictures and aerial photographs from neutral sources showed that Camp Falcon suffered major structural damage and almost all the U.S. military’s supply of small arms ammunition, artillery and rocket rounds, tons of fuel, six Apache helicopters, an uncounted but large number of soft-skinned vehicles such as Humvees and supply trucks were damaged or totally destroyed. Foreign press observers noted “an endless parade” of military vehicle recovery units dragging burnt-out heavy tanks and armored personnel carriers to another base outside Baghdad.

Many of the walls and towers of the camp were damaged or leveled as were many of the barracks, maintenance depots, and there was considerable damage to the huge mess halls that could hold 3000 soldiers, the huge recreation center with its basketball courts and indoor swimming pools and all the administration buildings.

Although official U.S. DoD statements indicated that there were no deaths; that only a hundred men were inside the base guarding billions of dollars of vital military equipment and that there were “only two minor injuries to personnel”, this didn’t pass the laugh test. In fact, the reality is more painful than propaganda.

Not only has the U.S. military machine lost much of its armor and transport, and its entire reserves of ammunition and special fuel, but the casualty list for only the first day is over 300.

Here is a transcription of that list of those who were evacuated to other hospital units:

Official Casualty List from U.S. military hospital at al-Habbaniyah located some 70km west of Baghdad. U.S. medical personnel at al-Habbaniyah initially stated that the US military hospital at the massive American-occupied air base there had begun to receive dead and wounded personnel. The military hospital in al-Habbaniyah, the largest in occupied Iraq, was opened on 12 May this year in response to sharply rising US casualties.